Okay early Chan starring vehicles; very heavy handed, with little
humor; a lot of training sequences, more than usual for the genre at
this time - these are more realistic than similar training episodes of
the period, but they lack of any inherent interest, perhaps for that
very reason. The fight scenes are well-choreographed, largely because
Chan is clearly choreographing himself. The actual 'wooden men'
sequence is unconvincing; this particular legend was best presented by
Joseph Kuo in "The 18 Bronzemen," where Kuo presents the Bronzemen as
men in bronze paint, rather than the robots or spirit-possessed statues
of other films. Here they are rather ungainly robots, and not very
threatening, to be honest.

The big plus of the film is the relationship between Chan and his
teacher, who is also the lead villain - that double identity gives the
film its real weight, and the resolution of this relationship in the
final fight is almost carried off - enough so to leave the fan of such
films of its era satisfied.

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